I like to bring news to the table when I find something interesting. Today I was reading about Royal Jelly on ergo, supplementing with it can seem to have some positive effects in a way most of us like!

'Royal Jelly raises testosterone levels, according to the Iraqi and Egyptian animal studies we wrote about recently. And according to a 2009 Japanese study, the stimulatory effect of Royal Jelly is not confined to the testes, but also works on the pituitary.

The researchers gave 9-month-old female rats feed that contained 5 percent Royal Jelly. [RJ] A control group was given regular feed. [CON]

The experiment lasted 7 months. Female lab rats become infertile during this length of time. Their cycle ceases because the production of LH and FSH declines.

In addition, the pituitary starts to make more prolactin and less TSH. TSH is the hormone that tells the thyroid gland to start producing thyroxine [T4].

The supplement had no effect on the rats' cycle. The Royal Jelly did reverse ageing effects by altering the production of TSH and prolactin.

After 7 months the Japanese measured the amount of hormones the rats' pituitaries were synthesising. The results are shown below. PRL = prolactin; GH = growth hormone; POMC = pro-opiomelanocortin.

The researchers found that Royal Jelly supplementation led to lower levels of prolactin and higher levels of TSH in the rats' blood.

The researchers hope that they can put Royal Jelly to use to lessen the hormonal effects of ageing."

"The Royal Jelly testosterone factor
You can find them in almost every drugstore: supplements containing extracts of Royal Jelly. According to an animal study done at the University of Mosul in Iraq, this common-or-garden supplement boosts the testosterone level.

Royal Jelly is a kind of anabolic porridge for bees. The drones in the bee world get to feed on Royal Jelly when they become larvae at the age of three days, and it causes them to grow dramatically. Hardly surprising, as Royal Jelly is packed with proteins and amino acids, hormones, fats, sugars, vitamins, minerals, RNA, DNA and gelatine.

The queen bee doesn't just get Royal Jelly for a few days like the drones, but for her whole life. A queen bee can live up to 7 years; drones are lucky to live for 6 weeks. A queen is fertile throughout her life and lays 2,000 eggs a day; a drone is sterile.

It's clear why the longevity movement swears by Royal Jelly. It's also the reason why the Iraqis wondered whether Royal Jelly could help men with infertility problems.

The researchers gave male rats ordinary water or water mixed with hydrogen peroxide. Hydrogen peroxide converts very quickly into a free radical that damages the testes. One half of each group got ordinary feed, the other half was given feed to which one gram of Royal Jelly had been added to every kilogram. The figure below shows that Royal Jelly protects the testes against hydrogen peroxide, and that Royal Jelly boosts the production of testosterone in the testes that were not exposed to hydrogen peroxide.

In untreated rats the testes had a weight gain of 35 percent as a result of the Royal Jelly, and the testosterone level rose by 79 percent.

The Iraqi study is from 2009. Seventy years earlier, in 1939, researchers at Harvard published an article in the prestigious journal Science stating that Royal Jelly contains 'gonadotropic hormones'. They based this claim on experiments they did with female rats. [Science. 1939 Jun 9; 89(2319): 540-1.]

The Royal Jelly testosterone factor ***8211; part 2
Yesterday we wrote about an Iraqi animal study in which Royal Jelly boosted the testosterone level. Researchers at the New York Medical College discovered back in the 1980s that Royal Jelly contains testosterone. A little. So little that it can't explain the effects that the Iraqis report.

Royal Jelly is a concentrate that makes queen bees live 60 times as long as ordinary bees. In almost every culture that keeps bees healers have found a use for this wonder jelly. In Kampo, traditional Chinese medicine, Royal Jelly is used to treat menopause problems. The Kampo tradition inspired Japanese researchers to study whether Royal Jelly can help against osteoporosis. [Evid Based Complement Alternat Med. 2006 Sep; 3(3): 339-48.]

The researchers removed ovaries from female rats and thus stopped estradiol production. [OVX] Then they gave the rats feed for 7 weeks that contained 0.5 [RJ1] or 2 percent [RJ2] Royal Jelly. Other groups were given the same quantities of Royal Jelly, but from a preparation that had been pre-treated with a protein-splitting enzyme. [pRJ] The bone-strengthening effect of the supplement is pretty close to that of synthetic estradiol.

The Japanese suspect that Royal Jelly contains a hormone that keeps bones strong. A well-known hormone, even: "Since Royal Jelly contains a male hormone testosterone, this agent may also be effective in men's osteoporosis that could be induced by a decrease of androgen", they write.

In 1984 endocrinologists at New York Medical College announced that they had indeed found testosterone in Royal Jelly. [Experientia 40 1984 104-6.] But as you can see in the table below, we're talking about nanograms. To make it clear: a nanogram is a millionth of a milligram.

Such a miniscule amount of hormone can't possibly have the effects attributed to it in the studies. Like the graph below. This shows the concentration of testosterone in male rabbits during the summer.

The figure is from a recent Egyptian study. [Anim Reprod Sci. 2010 Aug;121(1-2):174-80.] In Egypt rabbit is an important source of meat, but the climate is really to hot for them. The heat makes male rabbits infertile in the summer. In the article the researchers, working at Alexandria University, describe their successful attempt to boost testosterone and sperm production by giving the animals Royal Jelly.

What's interesting in the Egyptian study is the doses they used. The researchers gave their overheated rabbits 200, 400 or 800 mg Royal Jelly per kg bodyweight, in an oral form just once a week. The experiment lasted 6 weeks.

This stuff isn't interesting. It's fascinating: an oral substance that has an ergogenic effect if you take it just once a week. More about this soon.

Is this beneficial to women with thyroid issues? just curious..i have a friend

Thats one of the things I picked up from the first part about it helping with production of T4. Its interesting to say the least, but its also "newish" research. Not Royal Jelly, but the aspects in which they are discovering it can be used now.